'This should be a point of pride in the community': Laveen residents seek improvements to 5.8-mile city park

Laveen residents are lobbying Phoenix to repair and improve a park that stretches nearly 6 miles along a flood control channel.

“There’s a lot of irrigation that hasn’t been working, so instead of having grass, it’s just dust,” said Rebecca Perrera, who has been leading efforts to get the city to improve the park, where she frequently bikes with her family.

“It causes a lot of issues beyond just unsightliness," she said. "It causes a lot of issues with dust storms and asthma and air quality.”

Though Perrera and others were spurred to action by the possibility of securing funding through Phoenix’s 2023 general obligation bond program, it now seems unlikely that their proposal will receive bond money this cycle. But residents still want the city to prioritize long-awaited maintenance in what Perrera called a “true gem” of Laveen.

“It’s a city park, but I don’t think they treat it like a city park,” she said.

The Laveen Area Conveyance Channel was completed in 2005 and stretches about 5.8 miles from 43rd Avenue to the Salt River near the intersection of 78th Avenue and Baseline Road. It was created for both flood management and recreational use by the county Flood Control District, Phoenix and Salt River Project. Phoenix is responsible for the park’s operation and maintenance.

During the channel’s development, city officials imagined it as a smaller version of Scottsdale’s Indian Bend Wash Greenbelt, with scenic hiking trails, horse paths and parks running along either side of the wash.

That vision was never quite fulfilled, and now many areas surrounding the channel that were once grass have turned to dirt. Erosion makes bike riding a challenge, and only one of the path's street crossings has a traffic signal.

Perrera and other residents want the city to implement safe pedestrian crossings, plant trees, repair irrigation and landscaping, and provide shade, benches, exercise equipment and lighting — especially in the tunnel beneath the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway.

They want $4.9 million of the $500 million general obligation bond that's going to voters next year to be used to make these upgrades.

The bond program is meant to fund infrastructure and public facility rehabilitation. If voters approve the issuance of bonds, the city takes on debt to fund capital improvements and repays those debts with property taxes. Phoenix does not expect to have to raise property taxes to support a $500 million bond program.

This is the first time the program has been used in 16 years, but city officials have said that moving forward, they will make general obligation bond requests every five years.

Support for park rehab

City meetings to narrow down a list of projects that should be prioritized for bond funding began in August. From these meetings, a recommendation list will be presented to the City Council later this year.

Since these meetings began, more than 30 people have commented on behalf of improving the Laveen conveyance channel, according to city records.

Linda Abegg, the vice chair of the Laveen Village Planning Committee, said this project is ideal for the bond program because it’s a one-time funding request.

“Let’s get it back to where it should be, and then use the normal budget money to maintain that,” Abegg said.

But in the bond prioritization process, the conveyance channel project has been identified as a “future capital need." That means it likely will not be presented to the City Council as a project that should get 2023 bond money.

But Perrera and other supporters of the conveyance channel project are still advocating for funds.

Perrera hopes the project will be added to the bond proposal by the City Council, which has the authority to veer from the recommendations list.

"Any councilmember could request a change,” said Councilmember Yassamin Ansari, who represents District 7, which includes much of the conveyance channel. But, she said, the city's recommendation process is intended to end at “a good place that everyone can be happy with.”

Ansari said the council has been advised against increasing the $500 million amount because some economists predict there will be a recession next year and a bigger price tag would require raising property taxes.

Even if the Laveen channel project doesn’t get bond money this cycle, the effort from residents helps, Ansari said: “It demonstrates a need, it helps us on council and city staff to identify other ways to support."

“I think we can probably begin to pick some of the low-hanging fruit,” she said. According to Ansari, the funds for improvements like trash cans, more lighting, trees and shade could come from the city’s general fund or the parks department’s capital improvement budget.

'A point of pride'

Concerns about the state of the channel date back to at least 2014, when there were already issues with erosion and broken irrigation.

“It just seems like it keeps getting pushed down the road,” said Laveen resident Daniel Penton, who has been advocating for park maintenance. Penton said he bikes the channel three times per week with his partner.

He said the park hasn't received the funding it needs to reach its potential.

“There’s not many places you can see three mountain ranges — South Mountain, Estrella, and the White Tanks — from a walking path, and people should be able to experience that,” Penton said. “This should be a point of pride in the community, and people should feel safe to be out there, and it’s not at all."

The South Mountain and Laveen Chamber of Commerce and the Laveen Elementary School District are also supportive of rehabilitating the conveyance channel.

For the chamber, maintaining the park is an issue of beautification, said Joe Roselle, who serves as both the president of the chamber and the community engagement coordinator for the school district.

“The conveyance channel just looks abandoned,” he said. “Moving forward with more development, with housing and businesses coming out, we want our community set in the best light in order to continue the development. We feel like it’s going to hold us back.”

From the perspective of the school district, Roselle is concerned about safety and health issues. He pointed to the channel’s poor lighting and cracked sidewalks, as well as the dust that gets blown into the community. Two schools in the district — Desert Meadows and Rogers Ranch — are located along the channel.

Abegg, of the Laveen Village Planning Committee, takes family bike rides along the channel to get dessert at Crumbl Cookies and Scooptacular. She said the park is a great asset to the community.

“Laveen needs to be kept up to the same standard as the rest of Phoenix, and they need to prioritize getting it fixed up,” she said.

Madeleine Parrish covers south Phoenix for The Arizona Republic. Reach her at mparrish@arizonarepublic.com and follow her on Twitter @maddieparrish61.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Laveen residents seek improvements to 5.8-mile city park